Blair aide's wife attacks police for 'Gestapo' tactics

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The wife of Downing Street's former chief of staff, Jonathan Powell, has lifted the lid on the private fury felt by Tony Blair's inner circle over the cash-for-peerages inquiry, accusing the police of 'Gestapo tactics'.

In a remarkable intervention, which contrasts with the measured language of the former Prime Minister, Sarah Helm singled out a dawn raid on the former Number 10 aide Ruth Turner as a sign of police heavy-handedness.

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It was widely known in Whitehall that the raid on Turner deeply upset Blair and Powell. Helm writes: 'As if she were some street criminal, ready to scarper, Ruth's home was swooped upon by Yates's men and she was forced to dress in the presence of a female police officer. Then there was a tip-off to the press.'

Yates, who led the inquiry, has strongly denied any police leaks and insisted that his officers were merely doing their duty. Despite the Crown Prosecution Service's decision not to press charges, he has received public backing for how he ran the investigation from the CPS and Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair. Sir Ian said on Friday that he had 'always been satisfied' with the way the inquiry was being handled.


http://observer.guardian.co.uk/politics/story/0,,2132043,00.html

One can only hope that this will **NOT** happen here....

ON EDIT FOR NAUGHT...